Priceless
by Mindy35
Summary: Jack/Liz. Jack knows good value when he sees it.


Title: Priceless

Author: Mindy

Rating: K

Disclaimer: Tina made 'em, I play with 'em.

Spoilers: "Apollo, Apollo".

Summary: Jack/Liz. Jack knows good value when he sees it.

-x-

"So that is really how you view the world?" Liz climbed into one of the chairs opposite her couch, her face creased with concern: "With little flashing price tags all over everything?"

On the couch, Jack answered logically: "They don't flash. Well…perhaps occasionally. When something is on sale."

"That's terrible, Jack," she shook her head emphatically: "a shocking statement of the consumerist society we live in."

"Don't make me feel bad about this, Lemon," he gave a mild shrug, adding: "It's simply a talent I've always possessed. I've always been able to look at something -- or someone -- and determine its -- or their -- value."

Her expression became incredulous: "You do this to people, too?"

"People most of all," he asserted: "And I don't _do_ anything. It's completely involuntary."

"So you can't turn it off if you want to?"

"I don't see why I should want to."

"Jack, that's…not a talent, that's a curse." She furrowed her brow: "How can you live like that?"

"Quite prosperously, as it happens," he replied breezily.

"So...you're saying," she pulled her legs up on the chair with her, glancing around her cramped office: "…anything in this room, you can tell me its value."

Jack nodded: "Fairly accurately, yes."

She pulled the pen out of her hair and held it up: "How much was this?"

"A dollar," he replied swiftly, then added: "How profligate of you, Lemon, to actually buy your own pen to chew on for once instead of gnawing, quite literally, into the company's resources."

She pointed to the lamp on her desk: "And this?"

He shrugged: "Twenty dollars or there abouts."

"And my couch," she went on, nodding at it: "how much was that?"

Jack looked down at the couch he sat on, hands flat on its cushions: "I'd be greatly surprised if anyone paid anything for it, to be frank."

"Fine," she pinched at her sweater with two fingers: "what about this? What'd I pay for this?"

Jack eyed her momentarily. "Nothing. You stole it from your college roommate."

Liz hesitated, her eyes flicked over him. "True," she admitted: "but I was with her when she bought it and it was eleven dollars so…there."

"But that was many years ago," he countered effortlessly: "when that style was still in fashion. The sweater has since decreased in value to being practically worthless. Which, actually, is not too much of a disparity."

She let out a huff. "So, that's what you see when you look at me?" she asked, a definite edge in her tone: "My half-off jeans and my stolen sweater and my cheap haircut?"

"What haircut?"

"I get my hair cut!"

"Recently?"

"So, what…?" She waved a palm in front of her chest: "I have a big, old, flashing five-bucks-or-next-best-offer' sign right about here, then, do I?"

"No," Jack replied after a long silence in which he did not break eye contact, despite her irritated glare. "In fact, and perhaps I should've stated this initially to save myself this insidious grilling; _you_ are probably the one person I've met on whom I cannot fix a set price."

"Why," she demanded huffily: "what makes me so special?"

Jack's mouth turned up in one corner. "Lemon," he told her slowly: "I've been asking myself that for three years."

Liz blinked at him. "I…can't tell whether you mean that in a good way or a bad way."

"I mean it in the best way."

"So, then…" she gestured again to her chest area: "I have…nothing going on here?"

"Well," Jack mused, taking a lingering look: "I wouldn't say that exactly."

"I mean," she rolled her eyes and clarified: "I have no price tag on me?"

He met her eyes. "None at all."

A quietly pleased smile spread across her face. "It's because I'm funny, isn't it?"

"That is part of it," Jack admitted, mirroring her smile: "I don't want this to go to your head, Lemon -- I tell you this only because your self-esteem needs as much work as your hairstyle – but, at the risk of sounding trite, I find you…quite…unique and--"

"'_And_'?" she interjected, eyebrows raised: "there's more? Watch it, Jack, you'll give me a big head."

He frowned at her. "Don't interrupt when I'm trying to be sincere."

"I apologize." She waved a hand: "Go right ahead."

"I'm afraid the moment has passed now," he remarked, rising from the couch.

"Wanna know my party trick?" Liz asked eagerly, still curled in her chair: "My hidden talent?"

"If it has anything to do with abnormal body parts or spouting liquid from surprising orifices," he said, giving her a wary once-over with his eyes: "then I would have to say…no."

Her face fell. "Fine, if you're just going to make fun."

"Well, Lemon," he said, making his way to the door: "I think we have firmly established why you are the comedy writer and I am the future CEO."

She rose and followed him to the door: "We certainly have."

He stopped on the threshold, turned back to her face her. "Want me to do the writers for you?" he murmured, leaning in close.

She peered up at him, confused. "In what way?"

Jack raised his eyebrows and indicated the gang of writers all gathered around the large table in the next room, throwing things at each other as they waited for her.

"Oh...!" she let out a breath, getting it: "Price them, you mean? No, Jack, that's not nice."

He shrugged imperiously: "Very well. If you say so."

Liz glanced at the motley crew, some of whom were fake-vomiting into their scripts: "Well…maybe…just once," she grinned: "for fun." She pointed to the chief vomiter: "Start with Frank."

Jack smiled, took a breath and began pricing.

_END._


End file.
